An investigation into oil smuggling and revenue generation by Islamic state

This report is an edited copy of an original investigation undertaken on instruction by ARO Advisory Ltd in February 2016, by whose kind permission this is reproduced. The authors were tasked to undertake an investigation into the so-called Islamic State (IS) group’s core income streams and the level and type of support they are receiving from external actors. There is a huge amount of frequently conflicting information relevant to this topic available in the public domain, but this is found to be routinely uninformed and misleading.